Wine and Dine with Mount Vesuvius

Wine is the only artwork you can drink.

Luis Fernando Olaverri

Wine is such a complex beverage. Not only do you need the right ingredients, but the process, the soil, and the climate are also very important to find just the right balance. It was Luis Fernando Olaverri that said, “Wine is the only artwork you can drink.” Just like a painter uses a paper and a brush to pull colors onto a blank canvas, so does a wine drinker use his glass and hand to swirl the wine in the glass to pull out all of the aromas and flavors. When you look at a painter’s work, you notice visually if the artwork used light colors or dark colors. When you look at wine, you notice the shades of a bianco (white) or rosso (red). A painter uses different colors and strokes to accent the painting. A wine drinker uses his nose and the palate on his tongue to catch all of the different flavors to really enhance the experience.

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Deck the Halls with Salerno Christmas Lights

To love beauty is to see light.

Victor Hugo

During the Christmas holiday, you always expect to see Christmas trees, ornaments, Santa, reindeer, and the nativity scene. However, for me, the lights are the one element that really highlight the holiday season and magnify a Christmas tree or a house. Victor Hugo really says it best: “To love beauty is to see light.” At Christmas time, it’s the lights that heighten our visual senses and put a smile on our faces. Both Adam and I have great childhood memories of driving around different neighborhoods with our families just to see the lights on the houses. When we heard about the annual Christmas light festival in Salerno, Italy (a whole town decked out in lights!), we knew we had to see them.

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